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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: July 2nd, 2023

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  • Absolutely, for many it’s nice to be under one name even if there is no legal need. I do think though that in a world where taking the male family name is not a default and anything can happen, double barrelling becomes problematic as a solution. You can only double barrel so many times! We need a new tradition that is equal for everyone and scales well. My favourite is what I once witnessed at a fantastic wedding. Before cutting their cake, the happy couple literally did a coin flip to choose who would take the other’s name. It was easily the most exciting part of the day.



  • You make an interesting point, but I can’t help but feel it’s not completely the same and you’re reaching a bit. I feel like it’d be closer if GIMP, next to shape tools for squares and circles, literally had a ‘Joaquin Phoenix as the Joker’ shape. The crux of the issue as I see it in this part of the legal debate is whether or not AI companies are willing participants in the creation of potentially copyright infringing media.

    It reminds me a bit of the debate around social media platforms and if they’re legally responsible for the illegal or inappropriate content people keep uploading.


  • In additional to the other comment, I think there’s also a traditional fear of corruption in open source. If the code is public then malicious parties are free to read and take advantage of holes in the security. Secondly it would be possible to contribute code with secret functionality that goes unnoticed. These are fairly easily debunked but seem to remain in people’s heads.



  • Maybe a US/UK divide? At least in the UK boffin is relatively inoffensive depending on how it’s used. Eg if I build a fusion reactor in my garden my neighbour might say “wow, look at what this boffin did!” and it would be a complement where boffin is a stand in for a word like genius, only with a tounge in cheek touch of jealousy.

    Thinking about it I would say that ‘nerd’ is typically putting someone down for their intelligence or interests, whereas boffin is a light insult while identifying the ‘boffin’ as being smarter than yourself.